Okay, it’s driving me crazy that I get totally fishmeckled about what in the world to publish on my own website. One day it’s politics, one day it’s social stuff, one day it’s a funny spoof video about the annoyingly omnipresent Ali Brown, and then it’s why and how to use a Gravatar to let your picture show up next to comments on blogs.

Little pieces of my imagination appear all over the web under pseudenyms and pen names and once in a while I get all “focused” and post something here, only to abandon this attempt to be consistent to an imaginary niche, and then one day I happen to go to my site and see the last post is a month or two old.

Can you relate?

I think you can because the folks who tend to like my stuff the best appear, on closer inspection, kind of smart, philosophical, and ADHD, too. I’ve seen your websites.

So here I am a writer, and a fairly prolific writer, and if you count the barrage of verbiage I can generate about nearly any topic, yet I rarely publish my best stuff for want of a perceived need to follow the Internet marketing advice that a website, blog, ought to be focused so you can maximize open rates on the emails you send to your subscribers whom you can’t even really get to subscribe unless they can figure out in .6 seconds WHAT the hell they are subscribing to and hey wouldn’t it be swell if there was a marked up freebie to download as an ethical bribe to get you to sign up and really, that PDF or MP3 or EIEIO they download should be crammed with affiliate links or at the very least a big giant pitch for your entry point product?

I mean, hey, what are you doing even putting this stuff online if you aren’t trying to make a buck?

So, this site is a boneyard of broken links and false starts, laced with the occasional glimpse of good. I think the Goal Setting Rocket video is pretty cool, and you can listen to the audio over and over if you are tight on money and can’t afford that new Enya album.

It Would Be Nice If You Had A Point

AKA: Possible Endings to This Article/Post/Missive

1. I could say that I’ve found my niche and made a strategic decision to “bring you the best in saltwater acquariums, or PR/Branding or  blah blah blah”

2. I could renounce focus as a viable option and put up the header graphic I made last year with the tagline “Bi-Polar Marketing.” (Honestly, I can see both sides on this one.) And write about whatever suited me – maybe use a lot of cleverly named categories.

3. I could put up a splash page, (that would be kind of a single message landing page, for those of you in the 30 day challenge), and with links to my products. Maybe stick the blog on a link or only show content relevant to the stuff.

4. I could choose politics, or humor, or political humor (better known today as MSNBC or “What TV Would Be Like If They Had TV In Oz” and run off the Law of Attraction La La La La La Everything’s Awesome crowd who ate up Stardust Factor with a spork. (Thanks!)

5. I could continue to languish in my hamster reverie, occasionally re-emerging to tell the world about Coach Butts or European Dream Connections.

6. Start seeing the shrink who helped me through the whole “relationship thing” a few years back and burn $125 and 45 minutes to see if there’s a pony in here?

Do you have these sorts of conflicting thoughts about what to publish online? If so, I would really love to hear your thoughts, I truly mean it, your thoughts, on how you are processing it all. If you take the time to put your comments below, I will read each one and reply appropriately.

 

 

I’m walking into the 3 Kings Tavern with my friend Sean to hear The Hollyfelds, a very talented local country act, that is playing what is usually a hard rock/punk venue in Denver Colorado, and I’m bitching, ranting really, about my latest annoyance – that no original or interesting music has come out in the last decade.

There are only 12 notes in the musical scale. Just 12. That’s it. From Mozart to Gaga all the music you’ve ever heard is comprised of just 12 notes.

My Theory Is That All The Musical Notes Have Simply Been Used Up

Every combination of notes, every melody, every chord, every chord progression, every riff and hook have already been done before.

What modern musicians are left with is to simple regurgitate the songs of the past 50 years, which they are doing a lot, usually with some rap or alternative drum beat.

It’s really Sean’s fault that I’m back on this soap box. He told me about a girl who performed her latest song for his acting class with the compelling title “I Heart You” and that’s all it took to launch me into cascades of preconceptions and extrapolations of sameness in music.

Of course, I’m right about the song. Without hearing the tune I already know it will sound like a mash of Mariah Carey, Katy Perry, and whomever else is riffing the charts lately, with the words I Heart You and one other lyric repeated about an octazillion times, to a skippy melody, and the same studio mix that nearly every pop artist has used since Quincy Jones created the formula for Michael Jackson.

Sean agrees with me, more out of self-defense.

Then This Guy Walks On Stage And Begins Punishing An Acoustic Guitar

Micah Schnabel is the guitarist and singer for a group called Two Cow Garage (already he’s interesting – right?) and tonight he’s performing a random collection of songs he’s written that don’t fit in the Garage. I’ve never heard of this guy or his band but there are about 100 people who have and they are right in front of the stage jumping up and down as he literally thrashes an acoustic guitar with the opening chords of his set as though he’s got a power rock trio backing him up.

In an outfit that I Heart You will never consider, Schnabel is wearing what could be a plain white t-shirt from Super Target, jeans, thick black horn rim glasses and a denim beret cocked sideways. A pale lad, he’s got ample tattooedge, and a gigantic smile that looks like he walked into his own surprise birthday party,

There is nothing to suggest there might be a gym membership card in his wallet. He reminds me of what might have become of Michael J Fox had he dyed his hair black and gone an entirely other direction with his life.

The rocker suspends his musical percussion, goes straight to the microphone and starts belting out the lyrics to a song I’ve never heard – and will never forget.

Somewhere between primal scream and whiskey cigarettes, Micah Schnabel is not the most technically precise singer, but he is a killer songwriter. Guys like him, like Willie Nelson, like Kris Kristofferson, like Leo Kottke, like okay, Bob Dylan, transcend the rules of pop music because they actually wrote the songs, lived the songs and get to sing them any way they want to. Their connection to the work earns them that right.

“I cried when I wrote this song. Sue me if I play it wrong.” Steely Dan – Deacon Blues

At the end of the 2nd song, I’m standing just behind the 100 true fans as we all scream and clap. I turn to Sean and shout above the decibels:

“Hey, That Whole Thing About The 12 Notes Being Used Up? I Was Wrong. I Forgot About The Words.”

Armed with just an acoustic guitar, a microphone, and the same 12 notes everyone else gets, Micah Schnabel had grabbed everyone who was listening by the throat, shaken us, punched us in the heart, and then helped us to feel what had just happened and let it sink in to someplace deeper.

By the end of the set he had moved me to both laughter and tears, by layering his words on top of those 12 notes. Using the familiar as a jumping off point and inviting us to go somewhere new.

When You Have Nothing To Fall Back On You Are Finally Home

Introducing a song about “giving up rock and roll and getting a real job” he pointed out that he had tried that and it didn’t work out too well. And, that he had slept in his car for six weeks in pursuit of making it as a musician.

“Look, I got my before knuckles tattooed last week. I can’t get a regular job now. I’m totally committed to playing rock and roll. It’s all I’ve got.”

Sean turned to me and said “When you have nothing to fall back on, you are finally home.”

And, I Thought About Cognitive Dissonance In My Own Life

The last five years have been pretty rocky for me personally. I know you aren’t supposed to talk about this stuff. We are all supposed to be “shiny happy people” online and project an image that our ideas never fail, our stuff always sells, and the “up close and personal real me” videos are supposed to give you a glimpse of how awesome our lives are, with our toys in the background, and oh don’t we heart our kids, dogs, cats, birds, biz!

Brooming the speaker training course was important because I was just never going to get back on stage again. The course I created with Felicia is something I’m proud of. In that work I said pretty much everything I had to say about how to create a fee based paid speaking business. It is comprehensive and evergreen, and the material action going forward is marketing and consulting on the topic and Felicia is the perfect person.

I had been a professional musician for more than 10 years when I got into sales and started my own businesses, attended seminary and even became the preacher of a church in Texas, then had a great run as a professional speaker and then quit to do Internet marketing.

Where do I go from here?

Writing Cool Stuff & Helping Writers Monetize Their Work

I’ve written 3 self published print books as well as another 11 ebooks, and made a pretty good chunk of money from my writing both online and offline.

But, I’ve always put writing in the shadows, and focused way too much on the hypie-internet-marketing side of the books and courses I created online.

Now, it seems clear to me that my true calling is as a writer. And to help you dear readers, make money with your writing, in a way that empowers your personal and business goals and fuels the lifestyle you want.

Through everything it’s always been the words.

I don’t read music, I memorized thousands of songs word for word. Memorizing songs is about memorizing lyrics, which are usually phrases, small groups of words accented by the music, cadence, and timing.

It’s in my DNA. I automatically remember groups of lines in movie scenes, comedy routines, and conversations in one hearing.

Words are beautiful magical beams of energy, the stuff of rainbows and the gunpowder behind the bullets of ideas. Words sharpen and clear the world like a hard rain. Properly done every part of the human experience from physical to emotional from conceptual to philosophical can be expressed in many ways by simple words strung together well.

So, I’ll string some words together here, to the end of reaching the solo entrepreneur, the creative soul, with hopes to enlighten, inspire, and make your cash register ring up transactions for your writing efforts.

What say you?